Bruno Kreisky Foundation

for Human Rights

dr Felix Ermacora (Austria)

Felix Ermacora was born in 1923 in Klagenfurt. In 1942 after high school he moved to Innsbruck to study law at the Leopold-Franzen University, in 1948 he went on to get his juris doctorate.

In 1956 Felix Ermacora became a university professor for public law at the University of Innsbruck, and University of Vienna. In the early seventies he was a member of the Austrian Academy of the Sciences. Felix Ermacora was a delegate to the UN’s Human Rights Commission from 1959-1980 as well as from 1984 to 1987, and in 1974 he was their president. He was an important adviser for the UN on many political and legal questions. After 1958 he was a member of the European Human Rights Commission and starting in 1984 he was a reporter for the UN for Afghanistan. Additionally he was a member of the Human Rights Committee of the UN from 1980 to 1984. He was also a delegate at the Austrian National Assembly from 1971 to 1990. In 1992 Felix Ermacora co-founded the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Human Rights, with Manfred Nowak and Hannes Tretter. He was also the director of the institute that year.

As a human rights expert he advocated peace and freedom, as well as standing up for basic human rights. Felix Ermacora died in 1995 in Vienna. Felix Ermacora was awarded the Bruno Kreisky Prize for his commitment to freedom, humaneness and human dignity. In order to continue his cause the Felix Ermacora Society was founded in 2005 to support human rights.

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